Winner: Park City, Utah

Gero Breloer/Associated Press

Like her son Joss, Debbie Christensen wasn’t supposed to be in Sochi either.

Residents in their hometown of Park City, Utah, which hosted snow events at the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake, donated airline miles and about $10,000 to send her to watch her son compete. She’s sharing a room with Nancy Logan, mom of ski slopestyle silver medalist, Devin Logan.

Christensen’s gold medal and the community support are bright spots for a family fallen on hard times: Debbie lost her husband JD, Joss’ dad, when he died in August of congestive heart failure.

Loser: American Speedskaters at 1,000 Meters

Matt Dunham/Associated Press

Many expected Heather Richardson and Brittany Bowe to duke it out for gold on the big oval, where they ranked first and second. The Americans were counting on the pair, having been shut out of the medals so far.

Just days after gritty and inspired performances in the team short and free skates, helping Russia to gold in the new event, Plushenko’s body had had enough.

What was supposed to be the men’s short program wound up what is likely a final farewell for Plushenko, who appeared to injure his surgically repaired back in warm-ups.

With all eyes on him, spectators in the Iceberg arena were subdued into silence when he skated to inform the judges that he was done. Turning to the crowd, he gestured, palms up, put his hands over his heart and waved goodbye. A cool, if sad, Olympic moment.

Part of that was skiing with a broken foot numbed by a (hopefully legal) painkiller. But more painful was trying to race in heavy, wet snow that saw most of the field, some in shirtsleeves, trudging to the finish.

“In the last 30 meters I was almost walking. I was so tired,” she told The Associated Press.

Loser: Japanese Women’s Curling

Robert F. Bukaty/Associated Press

We weren’t sure it would happen, but it did: A curling team, for a day at least, proved worse than the U.S. The Americans had gone 0-4 prior to Thursday, when they defeated Japan, 8-6, to drop it to 2-2.

On the brink of elimination, the U.S. team lives to throw the rock another day.

Maybe this is the start of something...well, if not big, at least something.

Winner: Noelle Pikus-Pace (U.S.), Women’s Skeleton

Dita Alangkara/Associated Press

We hope we're not jinxing her here, but a a medal would finally fulfill promise from a long three Olympics ago. Noelle Pikus-Pace is in silver-medal position halfway through the skeleton, with tomorrow’s final two heats to go.

She was the gold-medal favorite before the 2006 Turin Games. The World Cup overall champion the season before, Pikus-Pace was hit by a runaway bobsled (yes, bobsled) following a training run, suffering a gruesome broken leg, and couldn’t fully recover in time for the Games.

Then in Vancouver, she finished fourth and retired before coming back for another go. But the heartbreak continued when she suffered a miscarriage in 2012. She comes to the Games with two kids and a sled-builder husband to cheer her on to, hopefully, a medal on Valentine's Day.

Loser: U.S. Nordic Skiers

Felipe Dana/Associated Press

Lowell Bailey’s surprising eighth place in the men’s 20-kilometer biathlon, the best finish in U.S. biathlon history at the Olympics, underscores the heightened expectations we have for even one Olympic cross-country or jumping medal. Just one.

Tim Burke, the World Cup multi-medalist and best hope in biathlon, has been sick and finished 44th Thursday in the event, won by Martin Fourcade, who collected his second gold of these Games.

U.S. women ski jumpers, Kikkan Randall and Nordic combined (the ski jumping/cross-country sport that won four medals in Vancouver) are all empty-handed so far.